I didn't think it was possible for me to be more disgusted by the sick and twisted life of Ted Kennedy than I was based on what I knew at the time of his death.

I was wrong.

I heard something Friday that gave me even more appreciation into the indecency, immorality and inhumanity of the late senator. Of course, none of the fawning news media bothered to pick it up. I guess it would have been considered bad taste during our national mourning period for the pervert.

Fortunately, it's on the record now, for future – perhaps wiser and nobler – generations to ponder and evaluate.

Ted Kennedy enjoyed sharing Chappaquiddick jokes with his close friends – including his biographer, Ed Klein.

Do you believe this?

Here's what Klein told National Public Radio last week in an interview with Katty Kay, filling in for host Diane Rehm: "He would ask people, 'Have you heard any new jokes about Chappaquiddick?'"

Klein said one of Kennedy's "favorite topics of humor was, indeed, Chappaquiddick."

I know. I know. You don't believe me. You think I'm making this up. So, please, don't take my word for it, listen to it for yourself.

"I mean, that is just the most amazing thing," Klein said. "Not that he didn't feel remorse about the death of Mary Jo Kopechne but that he still always saw the other side of everything and the ridiculous side of things, too."

No, no, no – I'm sure Kennedy felt plenty of remorse about leaving a drowning young woman in a car, where, according to the coroner's report, she spent up to two hours gasping for air, while Kennedy went home, showered, shaved and rested up for 18 hours before even reporting the crime!

People with great remorse always solicit jokes about their unspeakable acts of cowardice, right? It demonstrates what a keen sense of humor they have, right? It shows how they have a self-deprecating sense of humor, right?

No, not at all.

What it demonstrates is the complete invulnerability this monster had from any serious consequences in his life. He was completely arrogant, because he knew he could literally get away with murder – and did.

If you or I committed such a heinous crime, we would probably still be in prison – and deserve to be. But, for Kennedy, it didn't represent the end of life as he knew it. Instead, he went on to become a legendary legislator – in his own mind and the minds of his twisted supporters and acolytes. He went on to run unsuccessfully for president. He went on to become a "lion" of the Senate. He went on to elicit some of the most touching eulogies in the history of American politics.

I knew he was a coward.

I knew he was a pervert.

I knew he had no morals.

I knew he had contempt for America, the nation that provided him untold wealth and opportunity.

I knew he was a user and a drunk and an abuser.

I knew he was a blight on the American political scene for half a century.

But until I heard this interview, I didn't know just how ugly he truly was.

Joking about Chappaquiddick?

That's what happens when you let murderers off the hook.

They don't have real remorse. They don't have sympathy for their victims. They don't even have the common decency to pretend they do.

And that's all Ted Kennedy ever did with regard to Chappaquiddick – pretend that he was sorry. He was only sorry he got caught. He had no way out. So he threw himself on the mercy of the misguided people of Massachusetts, and they had the bad judgment to accept it and foist him upon the rest of us for far too long.

Let this be his epitaph: Ted Kennedy killed a woman and joked about it.